


Rhythm

by MerryMandolin



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Character Study, Depression, First War with Voldemort, Gen, Mental Illness, Suicidal Thoughts, an ode to the pain of the way remus lives his life, crumbling friendships, growing up into a war, lycanthropy, mostly sad with slivers of hope, set right before the potters are killed, werewolf transformation is horrific
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-03
Updated: 2020-04-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:28:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23459392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MerryMandolin/pseuds/MerryMandolin
Summary: There is an inevitable give and take in Remus' life, but it's almost never a balanced exchange.
Relationships: Remus Lupin & Lily Evans Potter, Sirius Black & Remus Lupin & Peter Pettigrew & James Potter
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	Rhythm

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this over a long period of time, most often gravitating to it when I was feeling very low and depressed & just wanted to get some of those feelings out on the page. I have always felt an odd kinship with Remus Lupin. There's something bittersweet about how kind and nurturing he is, despite the fact that he must feel helpless, powerless, and alone in his condition. That feeling of not being in control of your own life is so pervasive. But, despite the general gloom of this small tale, I do believe that those who suffer can emerge out the other side of it.
> 
> May anyone who reads this know that they are not alone, that there are those who can understand how you feel, and that there are things in life worth reaching and hoping for, even if they are just below the horizon where you cannot yet see them.

There was a sort of comfort to his transformation. Like the rising and falling of the sun, it always crested upon him, swift and reliable. A burning metronome in his head, swinging to and fro. A steady thrum beneath his skin, uncomfortably hot.

He could set his watch by it.

His fingers ached. Under pressure, he stitched them together in his lap, nails biting into the backs of his hands. The persistent itch in his bones did not subside, despite the fact it wasn't quite time for the main event. It was always like this; his body remembered in stark clarity what his mind could only foggily recall. Like a well-worn nightmare, he was waiting in the wings, the star of a play with not a single line memorized. It was little consolation that he had no audience-- His nerves were frayed enough without them.

Breathless, Remus wondered into the dark: ”Maybe I’ll die this time.”

Nobody answered, but he fancied a voice anyway. It made these times more bearable somehow. Like someone was there with him. Like he wasn’t alone.

 _Maybe you_ ought _to die,_ the voice said back. Dispassionate. Calm.

”No, I-- I shouldn’t think like that.” He huffed out a restless breath, legs shivering. “Survived this long, haven’t I?”

_For what?_

He grimaced, eyes fixed on his clothing in the corner. Plain and brown, they were camouflaged in the dirt, the silhouette of his boots the only defining marker by which to spot them. He ought to have kept them on; even though the fabric felt like sandpaper this close to the full moon, at least they would have kept him warm. Besides, it was pointless to put them across the room; by morning, they’d be ripped and stained with blood no matter where he placed them.

He searched the room for something else to dwell on. There wasn’t much to see: A disused barn, warded every which way against his own escape. A single candle beside him, unlit. A hay-strewn dirt floor, disturbed only by the ravines his bare feet had carved. A trough of brackish water. Errant hair, thin as cobwebs, clinging to his cracked lips.

A voice, imagined, echoing around him as if he were in an empty cathedral. Or, perhaps, the vaulted corridors of Hogwarts itself.

_Are you just going to sit there all night? You’ll go mad!_

Sometimes, the voice in his head sounded a bit like James. He had grown excessively doting after Harry was born. Or, conversely, perhaps he simply had nothing better to do than fret over his friends. James had always been difficult to read; hard to tell if his virtues sprang from honest affection or abject boredom. The only constant in the equation was that his vices were cut from the same cloth; often, he was equal parts caring and uncaring in the same breath, oblivious.

Remus pressed his fingers into his eye sockets, rubbing until colors bloomed in his vision. It was uncharitable to think of his friend like this, wasn’t it? Because that’s what they were. _Friends._ Or, well. At least he _hoped_ they still were.

Remus didn’t like to dwell on it, but his visits to the Potter household had grown steadily more unpleasant. He was “always welcome”, of course, but he suspected that sentiment had an expiration date; James would be all energy and pizazz at the beginning of the visit, remarkably quiet in the middle, then sullen and offish by the end. The day would be peppered with remarks that Remus didn’t have good responses for: The _Have you eaten?_ ’s and the _You’re looking a mite peaky_ ’s and, his favorite, the _Are you okay?_ ’s. In the past they’d been infrequent, interspersed with a tongue-in-cheek, _That time of the month, eh?_ But, lately… It seemed to be all they ever talked about.

Perhaps this was to be expected with his condition and the uncertainty of the war, but he couldn’t help feeling like it was all their friendship hinged on anymore-- a sense of duty on James’ part. The obligatory afternoon tea in which he pretended he hadn’t been fired from his job again and they pretended they weren’t utterly isolated by the Fidelius charm. An exchange of pleasantries, brief hugs, and a few stale inside jokes from years ago completed the ritual, all made strange by the fact they were cloistered away so clandestinely that even _Remus_ had no idea who their secret keeper was.

Little Harry, oblivious, would deposit nearby toys into his lap, zoom by on his little training broom, and make a mess of his food. Unburdened by the subtext of these encounters, he inspired both warmth and melancholy in the face of his family’s situation.

Then, as Remus prepared to leave, he’d have to endure the dreaded proposition. _Let me give you some money, Remus,_ James would always say. The omission of his nickname made it feel so much worse than it already did, like his friend had crossed into adulthood without him. _No, thank you,_ he would always say, though he’d really rather scream. They had enough to deal with already; better to suffer in silence than become a burden to his friends, he’d thought.

It was funny, in a way, that he wasn't allowed to see them anymore.

_What are you moping around for?_

Sometimes, the voice in his head sounded like Sirius. With every setback in the war, every injury and every death, Sirius had grown more and more frenzied. He’d always been a wild sort, but in school Remus had become skilled at avoiding his rampages, allowing James to settle him. Now, he was inconsolable; there was a zealous gleam in his eye at Order meetings, a suspicious caution to his prowling about the safe houses. Remus had foolishly arrived late to a meeting at headquarters on the day Marlene’s family was killed, and Sirius flew into such a rage that he still had the scars to show for it.

Remus hadn’t been back since.

He could understand his old friend’s desperation. His grief. His scrambling _defiance._ Their close-knit group, once so connected and powerful, was now all but disbanded. People they’d known since childhood were suffering and dying. Their enemies far outnumbered them. Ultimately, it seemed more and more likely that the Order was doomed to fail its mission.

Remus often found cold comfort in that simple truth. This rebellion of theirs had always been a shot in the dark, a last gasp of effort against a ruthless, unyielding adversary. It seemed obvious, to him at least, that they were a ragtag bunch of children, unaccustomed to hardship and just barely scraping by. And one day, he knew their luck would run out.

But Sirius… His idealism had turned him bitter. All that he had hoped for with such perfect clarity was dust and smoke-- He _hated_ the sight of what they had become, and dreaded the moment of ultimate destruction. And how could Remus blame him? He had felt that same fear, grappled with the horrific realization that the world as they knew it was crumbling, bit by bit. But he couldn’t match Sirius’ rage; Remus had long ago accepted their fate.

An electrifying jet of pain scrambled up his back, and he gasped, the muscles in his arms jumping. Remus folded his arms tightly, as if he could hold his own body together. Trembling, he wished he’d brought himself a book or something to pass the time. Unfortunately, he’d decimated most what he owned over the last year of full moons.

_It’ll all blow over in a little while, won’t it?_

Rarely, the voice in his head sounded like Peter. Visits with him were scarce. Anxious. Brief. His mother was poorly; Remus knew the others were helping to support him, but even so, every time he came in contact, Peter would ask for something more. _Spare me a few sickles, won’t you, Moony? I need it for the grocers._ Or _Has your dad got an extra blanket? Mum’s awful chilled during the night._ They talked of little else, and Remus almost always refused to engage. What could he say? That he hadn’t had a job in months? That he couldn't afford to feed _himself,_ much less anyone else? That he hadn’t lived with his father for several years? That he was holed up in an old, secluded barn in the deep countryside because he couldn’t pay rent?

When Peter eventually exhausted his list of requests, he would sit with a forlorn air, staring at the buttons on Remus’s robe with his nose scrunched. There was a hint of resentment about it, a juvenile petulance to the way he would ask if Remus hated him for asking too much. Inevitably, he'd have to reassure the man that they were still friends, that nobody hated him, and that yes, everything was fine, and, after an hour had passed, they would exchange goodbyes like strangers.

Remus couldn't shake the feeling of exhaustion every time Peter left, as if all the man could do was _take_ and, when he was inevitably unable to seize hold of any worldly possessions, he simply sucked the life out of Remus instead.

He sighed. It was awful, but even if he did have money, he doubted that he'd want to give it to Peter. It didn’t help that Remus couldn’t shake the feeling he was just a little bit _jealous…_ All his solicitations-- No matter how pathetic Peter acted, he always seemed to get _exactly_ what he wanted. Just by asking, his problems were instantly taken care of. How could Remus _not_ envy the simplicity of it? Despite behaving like a glorified leech, James and Sirius still liked _him_ better. In the end, Remus’ most uncharitable thought of all was a bitter realization that he’d made himself so burdensome and unpleasant that even childish, simpering _Peter_ was preferable company.

_You'll worry yourself to the bone, Remus._

Even more rarely, the voice sounded like Lily. She was a thing separate from the regular family gatherings; before the threat of Sirius's ire had barred him from meeting with them altogether, Lily had sometimes made a point to meet with him alone. While Harry napped and James was at meetings, she'd occasionally have Remus over, enlisting his help with whatever tasks she'd lined up for the day.

And they would properly _talk,_ like human beings. About… anything really. About Harry's newest developments, about old films, about bizarre wizard fashion, about dancing, music, art, cooking, sports, family, the _weather,_ even… anything but the war. Anything but how thin he was getting, how pale and sickly he looked. Anything but his relationships with his friends, as irreparably fractured as they were.

In everything, her care and concern was a balm to his wounded heart. She was warm, kind, patient. Lily had a way about her that made him feel like she wanted to hear what he had to say, that his company wasn’t a waste of her time. They confided in each other about their smallest fears and weaknesses, laughed when they were happy and cried when they were sad. No artifice entered their sphere, no pleasantries -- if they did not wish to talk, they simply didn’t. There was a kinship between them that he’d never experienced, an equal footing and a mutual understanding that he hadn’t realized he was yearning for until he found it. Like a single, vivid wildflower in a barren plain, her friendship was one of the only things he had to look forward to in his sorry existence; everything else was cold, dirty, _rotten._ But it wasn’t made to last; he hadn’t seen her in weeks. Her letters were still in their envelopes, sequestered in the hayloft above his head, too painful to open.

The spasms were coming at faster intervals. He shivered. It was nearly time.

Right before the change, the voice in his mind always fell silent. Overcome by agony, Remus could enjoy a few blissful minutes where it was impossible to overthink anything. Impossible to consider his attachments and detachments. Impossible to remember his failures. All that was left for him was to wait for death… but it never did come, no matter how many months and years and decades he’d endured the same horrifying transformations.

In the absence of his swirling, intrusive thoughts, Remus knew his own mind. The uncontrollable sadness that he carried with him everywhere was separate from the wolf; one had not caused the other, they were merely intertwined. Locked in stalemate, they prowled around each other with Remus caught in the center. They coexisted in his life like bad roommates: if one failed to lose him opportunities or ruin his relationships, the other would inevitably finish the job. It was the chaos of their infinite battle which left Remus exhausted, in tatters. He so rarely claimed any victories against them.

But he hadn't _always_ felt as he did now. He could remember a time when things were better. Or perhaps… just different. He was older and wiser than he was then, though times were darker. _There’s no use in looking back,_ his father would say. _Keep your head up, and before you know it, you’ll see the sun rise._

There was a small part of him, a bright, swelling thing buried beneath years of stress and grief, that still held on to hope. While there were yet some things good and pure and worth preserving in the world, he _wanted_ to reach for them. No matter how distant, they possessed the power to heal. There was a comfort in the pursuit of them, of knowing that his pain and despair would come and go, just as all things did in the rhythm of his universe.

As his bones cracked and reformed, his muscles bursting from their sinew to reattach elsewhere, the tissue of his neck stretching with the force of his screams, Remus’ only stability lay in the waxing and waning of the moon. Clockwork. _I don’t have my watch,_ was his delirious thought, but he didn’t need it: He took great heaving breaths in time with the ticking second hand. He crawled on his hands and knees minute by minute. The hours passed by to the ferocious beat of his heart. He never fell out of sync.

And when Remus finally startled awake, his sore, blood-stained body quaking in the frosty autumn air, he always managed to pick himself up again. To unlock the chains on his ankles. To clean and wrap his wounds. To pull on his soiled clothes. To prepare for his day as if nothing of any significance had happened at all.

Habitually, Remus left that place. Cyclically, he knew he would return. Perpetually, he walked through darkness, always in search of the dawn.


End file.
